panetta, our secretary of defense, has said the sequester would be a disaster. as it would be. and i refer to him for chapter and verse about the size of the navy, the air force, the army. where did that originate? where did that idea come from? turns out it came from the white house. turns out mr. jack lew had a meeting with senator reid and congresswoman pelosi and suggested this. and initially, apparently, they weren't too keen on the idea until defense was thrown in. now, how much does defense really amount to percentage wise in terms of the problem we as a nation face? if you talk about given budgetary spending every year, discretionary spending, defense is pretty nigh on 50%. if you talk about the real problem which includes entitlements, defense is 14%. if you look at the $55-odd billion coming out of the sequester, that works out to about 1.4% of our overall problem. but better than 10% of the defense budget. now, are you going to tell me that the solution to our national financial problems is cutting defense? and, oh, by the way, do you honestly think that the mullahs